Look, Glee's Lea Michele is really hot, and Dianna Agron isn't too bad either. So as a heterosexual male, I have no objection if they choose to partake in a somewhat risque photo shoot for GQ Magazine, although I do wish they had arranged for Jayma Mays to participate as well. There are others who may partake in a certain amount of finger wagging on the whole principal of the matter, but I've always been of the live-and-let-live philosophy. But what I do find annoying, if not a little disturbing, is the obvious differences in how female leads Michele and Agron are shot versus how male lead Cory Monteith is photographed. The pictures above are the most obvious (and least risque) examples, and they arguably speak for themselves. But just in case you need the obvious pointed out: the women are shot in overtly salacious poses in a state of semi-undress. Monteith is photographed fully clothed and (in his solo photos) engaging in relatively asexual behavior such as playing the drums or goofing off in the gym. I certainly don't need or want to see Moneith's bare ass or the man who plays Finn in any kind of compromising positions, but why is it that the women must be photographed with imagery out of a pornographic fantasy, while the male lead (and in fact most male actors in glossy photo shoots) get away with not doing so much as unbuttoning their top buttons? If you were going to do an entire shoot with Michele and Agron playing off the 'naughty schoolgirl' fantasy, wouldn't it have been a little bit fair to at least have a couple shots of Monteith with his shirt removed? Again, I'm not trying to get on a high horse about sexism and the double-standard of how men and women are photographed in Hollywood, but well, once you glance at the Glee pictorial, it kinda makes the point for me.
Scott Mendelson
I am SO freaking tired of seeing up and coming actresses doing risque photo shoots. Don't they realize that's actually gonna destroy their careers? By doing a risque shoot, you are turning yourself into a sex object and won't be taken seriously as an actress. Don't go down the Megan Fox route.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with you about the double standards either. They couldn't have taken a topless photo of him in his boxers? WTF.
You ARE aware that GQ is a men's magazine, right? I mean, it was called Gentlemen's Quarterly!!!
ReplyDeleteFair enough Martin... So why have Cory Monteith there at all? If it was just about entertaining the men with the ladies of Glee in sexually-suggestive poses, why not do a big photo spread with Michele, Agron, and whatever other female Glee members wanted to show up?
ReplyDeleteWhat IS the deal with the nearly naked or topless women in photoshoots with totally clothed men? Serioiusly wtf is up with that?
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah Martin, and the thousands of others who say "GQ is a MEN"S magazine"--You mean GQ readers can't handle a little sexy man skin---the way we ladies have all the female skin and flesh in Cosmo, Vogue etc. in Women's magazines?
That is, indeed, a good question. Why is Cory there? I have no idea.
ReplyDeleteI'm guessing it was trying to have these sexually appealing ladies and also capitalize on the Glee success, maybe?
What I do want to say is that I feel it's not fair (for lack of a better word) to demand the same standard in what it is clearly a men's mag. They want barely dressed girls, not guys. Is that wrong?
Now that I think about it... maybe having Corey M. there was a perfect excuse not to tell Reah and Dianna: "we're having a big photo spread with you, girls, barely dressed", but instead "we're doing a Glee shoot", or sth like that (?)
Aitch: sure, we can handle that. But why should we? What would be the point? Why would we want a shirtless guy there?
ReplyDeleteI am SO freaking tired of seeing up and coming actresses doing risque photo shoots. Don't they realize that's actually gonna destroy their careers? By doing a risque shoot, you are turning yourself into a sex object and won't be taken seriously as an actress. Don't go down the Megan Fox route.
ReplyDeleteI do agree with you about the double standards either. They couldn't have taken a topless photo of him in his boxers? WTF.
Aitch: sure, we can handle that. But why should we? What would be the point? Why would we want a shirtless guy there?
ReplyDeleteYou ARE aware that GQ is a men's magazine, right? I mean, it was called Gentlemen's Quarterly!!!
ReplyDelete